ePub custom Fonts on all Sonys

[ericshliao]

Originally Posted by dpierron

I may be able to help if you want, feel free to send me a private message so we can arrange for a transfer of your example file.

Thank you so much.

This is the sample ebook. Please unpack the attached zip package. There are 3 files:
1. "sample_embed_font.epub" is the ebook with embedded font and it's ok in ADE.
2. "sample_without_font.epub" is the ebook without embedded font and I made it to look for font in the same directory where the epub file resides. In ADE, every glyph of the ebook is "?".
3. "WenQuanYiZenHei.ttf" is the font to be used by "sample_without_font.epub".
Please put all the three files in the same dir.
Both the ebook contents and font are freely distributeable.

[dpierron]

Okay, I'll have a look !

Dave.

[dpierron]

So, it's after hours, and I'm home in front of my iMac ; this means I don't have Windows at hand, so I'll finish testing tomorrow.

But, the first thing I can tell you is that your 'without font' file, with this code, works perfectly :

@font-face {
  font-family : MyFont;
  font-weight : normal;
  font-style: normal;
  src : url(res:///Users/david/Downloads/sample/WenQuanYiZenHei.ttf);
}

Of course, I expanded everything in /Users/david/Downloads/sample

Tomorrow, I'll test and confirm wether it's a Windows problem or something else...

Hope this helps,
David.

[ericshliao]

Originally Posted by dpierron

I expanded everything in /Users/david/Downloads/sample

David,

Thanx for your help.

I want to investigate into how to set font path, both relative and absolute, in Windows XP. In "sample_without_font.epub", I use relative path because I don't know where you would like to put the font file.
In Windows XP, absolute path will start with a drive letter, such as C:. That makes it different from those unix family. How to set it properly bothers me very much.

[wallcraft]

Originally Posted by wallcraft

I tried on my EZ Reader (Hanlin V3) and it does not accept fonts in /Data or /home.

Tamzilla worked out how to do this on Hanlins (use res:///abook for the root of the SD card), see Fonts and Epub - What works on Sony, Works for Pocket Pro too!.

[dpierron]

Well, I tested with Windows XP and ADE and it definitively comes from an ADE bug. Let me explain...
I expanded the ePub file into a folder, edited the CSS file, setting an absolute path for the font resource and then opened the HTML file with Firefox ; guess what, it worked out of the box.
When I did the exact same thing directly in the ePub file (same edit) and opened it with ADE, it didn't work (showing question marks instead of asiatic-looking thingies).
So, it has something to do with ADE ; either it's a bug, or it's an obscure point of the ePub standard that ADE enforces ? I can't tell...

Hope this helps,
David.

[ericshliao]

David,
Thanx for your test and advice. I have tried various combination of url strings that I thought correct, but ADE just don't accept them. I've never thought it's fault of ADE. Now I know the problem may come from ADE, not from my url strings.

[dpierron]

Not really from ADE itself, but from ADE in Windows ; the Mac version of ADE eats externalized font resources at every breakfast

[wallcraft]

Originally Posted by dpierron

Well, I tested with Windows XP and ADE and it definitively comes from an ADE bug. Let me explain...
I expanded the ePub file into a folder, edited the CSS file, setting an absolute path for the font resource and then opened the HTML file with Firefox ; guess what, it worked out of the box.
When I did the exact same thing directly in the ePub file (same edit) and opened it with ADE, it didn't work (showing question marks instead of asiatic-looking thingies).
So, it has something to do with ADE ; either it's a bug, or it's an obscure point of the ePub standard that ADE enforces ? I can't tell.

I don't think this is complicated. If ADE (or a web browser for that matter) fails to find the referenced font then it uses the default font, and hence the question marks. The "res://" is with respect to the app's root directory, but that does not have to be the system's root directory. So, the Mac ADE has the expected root but the Window's ADE has some other root - which we don't know (or I guess it could have no root at all, for "security" reasons).

There are a couple of examples of this with mobile ADE:

The Windows Sony ebook library reader has a root of C:\Program Files\Sony\Reader\Data\bin.

It isn't clear what the Hanlin's (V3 and V5) root is, but it isn't the root of the system filesystem because so far only the SD card appears to be visible (at res:///abook) and not the user-accessible internal memory.

Under Linux (or Unix, e.g. on the Mac), softlinks can probably be used to build whatever kind of access restrictions for "res://" the app developer wants. I don't think this is as easy under Windows, or on Windows-like filesystems.

[dpierron]

Interesting !

[ericshliao]

Originally Posted by wallcraft

I don't think this is complicated. If ADE (or a web browser for that matter) fails to find the referenced font then it uses the default font, and hence the question marks. The "res://" is with respect to the app's root directory, but that does not have to be the system's root directory.

That's quite reasonable. I will have some test. Thanx for the tips.

[yekim54]

Originally Posted by wallcraft

The Windows Sony ebook library reader has a root of C:\Program Files\Sony\Reader\Data\bin.

Thank you so much for this bit of information. You've solved one of the problems that's been vexing me for weeks.

[gregcd]

I've had a coulpe months with caecilia and felt its time for a change. This is a slab serif that has some modern flair:


{pic}

It's Museo 300. Three different weights are available free at http://new.myfonts.com/fonts/exljbris/museo/

[Abecedary]

Originally Posted by gregcd

I've had a coulpe months with caecilia and felt its time for a change. This is a slab serif that has some modern flair:


{pic}

It's Museo 300. Three different weights are available free at http://new.myfonts.com/fonts/exljbris/museo/

There's hardly anything slabby about that serif (and it barely comes across as a serif, too). I could see it working pretty well as a display typeface in certain situations, but it'd drive me crazy to see it used as a body font. But to each his own...

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by gregcd

I've had a coulpe months with caecilia and felt its time for a change. This is a slab serif that has some modern flair:


{pic}

It's Museo 300. Three different weights are available free at http://new.myfonts.com/fonts/exljbris/museo/

Not bad, but what I see is an issue is that's not ePub you are showing and the font does not have italics or bold italics from the link you posted. So it really doesn't work as a true font family. The screen shot is LRF. And LRF simulates bold, italic, and bold/italic. In order to be useful for the main body text in an ePub eBook, it has to be a complete font family.